


Minos

by Coffin Liqueur (HP_Lovecats)



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Drama, Dysfunctional Family, Estrangement, Gen, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Pre-Canon, Relationship Study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-26
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:54:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23707210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HP_Lovecats/pseuds/Coffin%20Liqueur
Summary: Dorian, Halward believes, is effortlessly brilliant by nature, and has been ever since he was born.He is far less proud that it's become increasingly apparent in his eyes, as his son has become a young man, that Dorian is also complacently naive.
Relationships: Dorian Pavus & Halward Pavus
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5
Collections: Gen Freeform Exchange2020





	Minos

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Penknife](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Penknife/gifts).



> Disclaimer: Don't get me wrong, despite the POV of most of this, I will never argue against the simple facts that Halward deserves a punchin', and Dorian is a fantastic beast and where to find them.

Dorian was perfect - more perfect than Halward ever could have anticipated.

He had known that he would be handsome, like Halward himself had been in his younger days, before putting on the outward solidity and weight that came with age and authority. Dorian was already a beautiful child, wearing his breeding on his charmingly-smiling face, in his intelligently-sparkling dark eyes.

He had hoped that he would be clever, which Dorian had utterly begun proving to be. He asked many, many questions and enjoyed argument - oh, how this would be dangerous in many another child dealing in any of the courts, certainly, but Dorian was also bold, prepared to master any knowledge that, instead, could have been used to frighten him.

And it would have been simply shameful if he hadn’t had half the magical prowess that he did.

This all came together in Dorian, even as young as he was, exhibiting an effortless, natural ability to  _ awe  _ that Halward had never once seen before.

He enjoyed enhancing his natural grace and handsomeness in a way that Halward had never seen in another young boy. He loved to play with the colors and shine of rich noble gowns and robes rather the way he sculpted lights and shapes from the Fade drawn into his hands, drawn to conducting himself as a  _ prince _ , not a  _ ruffian _ .

His wit dazzled just as easily - ah, how many times Halward had laughed incredulously at the boy weaving a clean explanation on magical theory which he, himself, knew he certainly had not discussed with him; at him inquiring as to traditional acts that he knew he had never questioned while he was at his age; at him making an almost ruthlessly cutting remark on a difficult associate once such mages turned their backs, and looking up at his father with a smile that pre-assumed agreement!

And nowhere did it show quite like in his magical acumen that Dorian was truly driven to  _ achieve _ . To  _ awe _ .

When his training had begun, he seemed as if he awed himself by the brightness of the flashes of fire from his hands; for him to appreciate his power for what it was had been, of course, a good first step.

It was clear he’d since sought to amplify that. As he practiced, now, in perfect turns and anglings of staves and arcs of elemental force that rippled and pulsed the air around him giving his small body the presence of flying too close too a star - a shining war-dance - it was if it wasn’t only himself he wished to  _ look  _ and  _ astonish _ , or only the magic that he felt the thrill and enormity of  _ commanding _ .

And Halward was  _ surest  _ that that was the case when he stopped, and slowed, and gathered himself, straightening himself out and pulling his robes un-rumpled, and flicking stray curls of hair off from his forehead.

And smiled at him, eyes large and at their most glittering.

And Halward smiled in return, finding his eyes softening, a soft warmth in the bottom of his heart, humbled at the implication that Dorian would dedicate such displays to him, simultaneously proud and almost unworthy despite being the father.

It wasn’t even arrogance of youth.

Dorian truly was a natural, taking joy in this.

Being born to be  _ admired _ .

To  _ captivate _ .

* * *

Every one of Dorian’s points of charm and grace and brilliance had been natural.

Ever since he was born.

Halward was proud that Dorian was brilliant.

How, ever, could he not be?

He was far less proud that it had become increasingly apparent, as his son became a young man, that Dorian was  _ naive _ .

What had once been precociousness had aged to take on a note of impetuousness. Dorian was too clever, for his own good. Too quick to display his sharp wit. What had once seemed a fascination with truly appearing as a noble and taking as much joy in beauty as in magic had now come to seem as frivolity.

It gnawed and it burned in Halward’s chest - heat roiling like the air of a furnace, instead in the mouth of a bone-chewing dragon, teeth grinding against teeth.

How at times he still felt undeserving.

Dorian was too perfect, in terms of technicalities.

And something stung, now, when Halward saw him achieve and draw the eyes of rivals, or charm courtiers, or say something that no one else, surely, thought, or needed to hear, and he felt what long ago would have been the start of a burn of pride, or tingle of amusement.

He _did_ suspect Dorian had become arrogant as a youth. This despite how pure he knew him to be in his drivenness, and his curiosity, and his spirit. Dorian knew it, too, and trusted in that far too hard, too blindly.

And thus Halward could no longer let his own feelings be purely pride anymore. Dorian  _ didn’t understand _ , and this concerned him. Dorian was content to _stay naive._  


Dorian, he thought, did not understand that he was not an  _ island _ . He could not simply  _ be perfect _ . This was an empire he was to be a prominent figure in, and a country and prominent figure were subject to rules. To this day, Dorian had never proven he’d learned the meaning of being serious; being so joyously cavalier was for enrapturing courtiers, and would not cow so many people now with its precocity - he doubted that the elder Enchanters at Minrathous appreciated debate with a rebellious and sharp-tongued young man the way they may have once stood for the wild statements and unpredictable questions of an active-minded child. Dorian knew no respect, and knew not any longer how to  _ earn  _ it, and knew no restraint - and had learned none even after each of those training sessions and _duels_ in which all of his dancing and dramatics had led to destruction.

He found that he was not angry at Dorian for this. Behind his ribs, a bitter relief twisted that Alexius had provided him another opportunity to continue shining.

He was not quite so at ease when it came to Dorian’s lack of regard to his House.

House Pavus could not lose him.

The pinnacle of everything the House’s bloodline had ever pursued, and he thought that his father would not notice him speaking ill of Lavinia to his companions as if about a commoner who had sassed him in the market, laughing, before turning about and giving his sidelong glances and flattering remarks to other young men, as if their family was a joke.

By extension, surely, as if he was a joke - and thusly no wonder he now refused to learn nothing.

As if, by further extension,  _ surely _ , their histories as Tevinters was a joke, and as if the respect they’d accumulated as Magisters, truly, was as well.

Dorian did not want to learn. He did not know why he  _ should _ , yes.

_ Dorian did not understand. _

It made Halward’s face flush, and he told himself, consciously, that it was due to many things: sorrow, fear for the future, fear for his son. Certainly not anger, not defensiveness, not outrage, not shame, despite how very very hot it felt, at times, inside his skull.

It was doubtless that Dorian knew he was valuable. He had seen to it that he had understood that quite fully from a young age.

But he needed the boy to understand more fully  _ why _ .

He needed him to understand that his father valued him, surely, more than anyone could. That his House did. What he could mean to Tevinter, if only Halward could bring him to see the meaning of things. Dorian innately understood many things; now he had to extrinsically look around him.

And Halward intended to stop him, for a moment. So that he had no other choice but to do so.

Sometimes, valuable things need to be saved from destroying themselves.

Flaming out or running away with every bit of beauty they had ever brought to their surroundings, never to be seen again.

* * *

For the second time in his life, Dorian ran away, adrenaline fluttering through his system and anger and sorrow aching in his chest at the notion that his place in life, as given, was to be trained to fly beautiful loops in a private aviary, alone, for the select admiration of a few; betrayed thinking of the days when Father was so proud to see him truly start to be, in ones where, it seemed, he’d rather now make him be.

This time, in advance, he intended for no one to  _ save  _ him apart from himself.

His hand had been forced. He could not stay in Tevinter anymore, drinking to dull the soreness of all the country pressing back at his every action so as to give no yield, no progress, no sense that any thing he did by choice  _ meant  _ anything anymore, after he’d been young, feeling like he could move a mountain with a single gesture; now waiting for chances and room to make a dent that, it seemed, would have never come before it was too late, anyway - it was true; he was not quite subtle enough to play that game, or do so with any patience, at the least. His pride in what he was still certain he could truly be did not allow it.

He needed to go and search and search for a place that would give him enough room to unleash his capacity to  _ burn _ .


End file.
